Share it?

All Japan news’s National Tax Agency has announced it will undertake testing of alcoholic beverages produced near the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant for radiation contamination.

Water samples used for these different kinds of alcoholic beverages will be checked if they contain radioactive cesium or iodine levels that exceed the safety limit set by the government. Samples which may be found to have these radioactive components above government-set safety limit will be banned from shipment. The tax agency may also direct local authorities to undertake other appropriate measures.

The tax agency said these beverages include beer, wine, and sake which are produced in factories and breweries within the 150 kilometers of the nuclear plant. Those outside of this set radius will still be tested randomly.

Testing of these various types of alcoholic drinks will be done in stages, one after the other. The schedule for testing of wines will start in October, the sake in November, while the beer and other kinds of liquor will be tested beginning February next year.

Taxation bureaus in six cities including Tokyo and the National Research Institute of Brewing will conduct the testing which will commence next month and its results will be posted in the website of the National Tax Agency.

All Japan news had earlier conducted a testing of rice and barley, the main ingredients for alcoholic drinks, for radiation contamination. The government said another testing, this time of water samples used for beverages, would help “put consumer at ease”.

The country is said to have around 3,000 brewers of alcoholic beverages and about one third of this figure would be put for testing for radioactivity.